Live TV coverage has been canceled. The water is low. But (forgive me if you’ve already heard this in this space over the past five days) the 40th Kenduskeag Stream Canoe Race will still be run Saturday.

Honest.

Tracy Willette, Bangor’s superintendent of recreation and the race director, said some confusion seemingly remains, with the race looming three days away.

“There’s a lot of speculation out there,” Willette said Wednesday afternoon. “People take a look at [the stream], they ride by it as much as I do and they see that it’s low. It’s rocky. There’s no doubt about it.”

And there’s also no doubt about this: No matter what you’ve heard, the stream is still passable. It may, however, take a bit more time and effort to complete the 161/2-mile course.

Kenny Cushman of Hampden, a top-notch kayaker and past winner of the race, checked out conditions Tuesday evening while paddling with another competitor, Jeff Sands.

Cushman and Sands put in below Six Mile Falls and paddled downstream to the Valley Avenue bridge.

“[Tuesday] it wasn’t too bad,” Cushman said. “I pretty much found a path about anywhere on the river. You had to weave around a little bit from one side of the river to the other to find the water, but you could find water pretty much everywhere.”

Cushman compared water levels to those found back in 1999, when race organizers faced two divergent challenges in the same race.

“Ninety-nine was the year we ended up moving the finish line,” Willette recalled. “It was interesting. We had two dynamics going: We had the unusually high tide at one end which prohibited us from going under the bridges downtown, yet we had some incredibly low water on the other end.”

Willette said rumors continue to swirl, but said the race committee has no plans to change the way the race is run, nor to institute any mandatory portages at Six Mile Falls or other rapids.

Willette said, however, he and race committee members will continue to monitor the stream and could react to any potentially dangerous situations as late as Saturday morning.

“Because of the way the Kenduskeag does change, and can change slightly higher or lower, we prefer not to make decisions too far [before race day],” Willette said.

While Willette couldn’t say how many paddlers had pre-registered, he said numbers appeared to be down from past years.

“You do this enough and you can just look at the stack [of entry forms] and say, ‘We should be more than that right now,'” Willette said. “And just the traffic in and out of the office [has been lower].”

Cushman said the conditions won’t stop him from paddling, but may change his tactics.

“I think I’m 75 percent decided that I’m going with Jeff [Sands] in a two-man kayak, just because with the low water, it will be a lot better on morale with two people to power through the low water,” Cushman said.

Cushman said Willette’s earlier assessment of conditions – that low water would reduce the number of navigable chutes, creating congestion in some places – was accurate.

“Six Mile Falls will be the interesting place,” Cushman said. “I just think of all places, that’s a section of whitewater that needs some water in order to navigate. It’s ledgey and it has a drop, so if you don’t have water there [it could create problems].”

And while Willette continues to monitor conditions, the race director said he places a lot of faith in the race committee members, some of whom have been involved with the race since its inception.

“I had a [committee] member come in this morning and they were talking about previous years and different conditions,” Willette said. “And the comment [they always make] is, ‘It isn’t Saturday yet.'”

Salmon hearing date set

If you’re one of those avid anglers who’s itching to fish for Atlantic salmon in the Penobscot River again, you may want to mark down an important date.

The Maine Atlantic Salmon Commission has set a tentative date of May 25 for its public hearing on the proposed fall experimental season.

The hearing is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. at Holden Elementary School on Route 1A, about five miles from Bangor.

The ASC has proposed a regulation that would call for a limited catch-and-release fishery for Atlantic salmon in the Penobscot which, like all other Maine rivers, has been closed to salmon fishing since 1999.

The season in question wouldn’t take place in the spring, when most traditional fishing occurred, but during the fall.

To remain updated on the matter, and to hear more about salmon restoration efforts, you can visit the Atlantic Salmon Commission’s Web site at http://www.maine.gov/asc/.

John Holyoke can be reached at jholyoke@bangordailynews.net or by calling 990-8214 or 1-800-310-8600.